Using the DNS Domain Trace View

When you create any DNS domain trace test, you get access to the DNS Domain Trace view. The DNS Domain Trace view leverages the ThousandEyes standard layout, documented here.

This article highlights specifics shown in the DNS Domain Trace view. To get started with views, see Getting Started with Views.

Example

This example shows the result of a globally distributed DNS domain trace test, targeting thousandeyes.com:A.

DNS Domain Trace View

View Specifics

The DNS domain trace test provides the following metrics:

• Availability: The percentage availability for the requested DNS record.

• Final Query time: The average response time from the final (authoritative) DNS server.

For details on available metrics, see ThousandEyes Metrics: What Do Your Results Mean?.

Timeline

The timeline shows the average of the selected metric for the domain, calculated across all agents. When a single agent is selected, the timeline plots the availability percentage of the target domain or the final query time measured from the agent.

Use the overlay to compare a single agent with the average selected metric measured from all agents assigned to the test.

DNS Trace Timeline With Single Agent Overlay

Map

• Multiple Agents View - Computes the average of the selected metric across all agents.

  

  DNS Trace View Map of the Availability Metric

  

  DNS Trace View Map of the Final Query Time Metric
• Single Agent View - Shows whether the target domain is available from the agent (that is, OK or Error), the number of queries, and the final query time. For detailed trace information, click the View Trace link (similar to dig +trace <domain_name> from the command line).

  

  DNS Trace View Map Details for a Single Agent

Table

For each agent assigned to the test, the table shows the agent name, the date, status, a Trace link with full trace information, all mappings returned for the domain trace query, the number of failed queries, total number of queries sent, the final query time in ms, and the final server queried.

DNS Trace View Table of the Availability Metric

DNS Trace View Table of the Final Query Time Metric

Note that there is no jump-to menu available for a DNS domain trace test, since network measurements cannot be enabled against many servers, due to the proliferation of anycast DNS services on the Internet.